Saturday 30 November 2013

200 miles in a month!


This is the second month that I've managed to do over 200 miles, which I'm really pleased with seeing as my target was only 132 miles a month.
I'm still gutted about only doing 81 miles in May, but I have made up for it by pushing my average up to 161 miles a month.

I did go out for my second ride with Fareham Wheelers at the start of the month. I was extra keen and cycled the 8 miles out to Wickham rather than drive. This, with the ride home took the total distance to 49.8 miles. My bike computer showed over 50, but when I checked Strava later it showed only 49.8. If I had known I would gone round the block to hit the 50 miles mark.

It was a nice ride out, I went with the "Social" group, but some of the hills weren't that social. But is was great to find some new routes and get the experience of cycling in a group. Drafting or sitting close behind someone makes a massive difference, you just get pulled along without much effort.

I've also managed to get Haribo Joe back out on his bike a couple of times this month, which was great. One of the rides was with two other friends, Chris and Paul who are also just getting back into cycling. The plan was to make it a regular ride, but it has only happened the once so far, wrong time of the year to be starting things like that.

I keep looking at my total figure of 1770 and wondering if hitting the 2000 mark will be possible this year. It would mean doing my second highest total for a month, in probably the worst month of the year, bad weather, going away for Christmas and any other excuse I can think of. 

It might be the wrong attitude but I often prefer not to set massive targets, because I prefer to hit my targets. This limiting belief, as they call it, is probably holding me back in a lot of areas, so it is something I need to think about.

As always please feel free to leave any comments or suggestions that you think might help me or other readers.


Friday 8 November 2013

Still on track!

 
Its been a while since my last update, but I'm glad to report that I'm smashing last year figures.
There has only been one month, May, where I didn't hit my monthly goal of 132 miles but that was down to my dodgy knee keeping me off the bike for a few weeks.
But my monthly average is at 157 miles, which I'm pleased about.
 
A lot of the extra miles have been cycling to my new job, it's about 4 to 6 miles depending upon which route I take. During the summer I can't think of a better way to end a day at work than a nice bike ride with part of it along the coast.
It wasn't so nice last week when it was dark and I had a basic light. There are two types of lights, see and be seen.
I had a "be seen" light and I was confident other cars could see me, but it was a bit of guess work along some of the country lanes I go down.
Since then I have borrowed Haribo Joe's Hope Vision One light and it makes a massive difference, I could see where I was going.
 
I have been for a couple of rides with the local cycling club www.fareham-wheelers.org.uk/ which was really good. Nice to find some new routes and get the experience of riding in a group, which is quite daunting. There are usually only about 12 people in a group, so you have to be careful about what other riders are doing but you do get dragged along at a good speed.
 
I used to go to the doctors to get weighed, but I haven't been for a few months, but I'm confident that I'm still losing weight, or maybe my clothes have just got that little bit bigger.
I've almost reached the worst part of losing weight where I need to go shopping for new clothes, can't think of anything worse.
 
It is getting harder to get out due to the weather but I just need to man up and deal with the rain, you can only get so wet.